Has anyone listened to this in its entirety?I've been enjoying it for the first 50 episodes or so, about the Kingdom and the Republic. But when it came to Emperors, I'm not enjoying it as much personally, there's a lot more family drama and emperors' feelings. Maybe thats just meI know that kinda reflects the historical reality, but i still dont like it. I'm thinking of dropping it and switching to some other content, more indepth about the Republic if the source timeline itself is superior
Haven't tried it yet but I really liked his revolutions series. I know he isn't necessarily the most in depth but I think he does a good job of giving just enough detail to inform and immerse without getting bogged down in anything too meticulous that'd make for dreary listening (aka, it'd have been better in a book).
>>18463922I definitely feel like Rome falls off a little with the Emperors.You don't get the existential threats and dramas of the rise of Rome, the invasion of Pyrrhus, the punic wars, the period after the punic wars where they're wrecking everyone, but also the sources really thin out as you get into the principate so you cant track the interpersonal drama and living moment and progression of things like you can with the Late Republic.Nowhere before and after the Late Republic can you get into such detail and the catty interpersonal drama of so many people involved, with a lot of first hand sources actually written by some of those same people.This isn't helped by the fact that the Principate centralizes power so there's less catty fighting about what's going to happen and whose going to get to do what, with the extension of those disputes into civil war. But I do feel if we had late republic levels of surviving sources it would sketch out the situation enough to make it more interesting, if still not quite at the level of the late Republic. Its not even quite the same to skip to late rome where there are big civil wars and infighting again, because the sources have gotten even worse. You can't follow it and get to the depth you can with the late Republic.
>>18463998Also Adrian Goldsworthy's channel on youtube is fantastic for alternate Rome background noise.
>>18463922Once you get to the emperors, you kind of are stuck with them because they are the people calling the shots and basically anyone else competent gets the short end of the stick least they try to become emperor themselves. Granted I would say atleast try listening past the Julio Claudidans, they tend to be the most "soap operas" of the Roman dynasties since they have the most well recorded histories and had members pushing the Boundaries to figure out how the new role of emperor works. The Flavians are more policy driven and less colorful..if you don't like them then I don't blame you dropping the series
Why does he like Marcus so fucking much?Anyway, I listened to all of it some years ago and then went on to History of Byzantium. I unironically like Robyn more, I was pleasantly surprised to find out he was not poisoned by Sack of Constantinople propagandaI will have to relisten to them once again. Revolutions is good but, surprisingly I'd say, Mike gets more left-wing as time passes. He does not endorse the Bolsheviks, but it is clear he has a soft spot for the Left SR. And he really hates Nicholas II lmao. His podcast on the Spanish Revolution will have potential.
>>18464030I meant Marius, sorry
>>18464031> Why does he like Marius so fucking much?I didnt get that impression from the episodes. And I'm absolutely Team Sulla.Though he does praise Marius reforms a lot, which modern sources claim were falsely attributed to him (or any single man).
>>18463922I also don't like the way things went later in the series, and he pulled straight from Gibbon when he dismissed the East Roman empire. I know plenty of faggots hate East Rome, but he could have at least gone until Justinian. Still pretty good podcast series and a good starting place for anyone that wants a basic overview of Roman history.
Everything he has done is broadly accurate and useful except for that stupid book where he tries to compare the collapse of Rome to the current state of the USA.
>>18464080That's an incredibly lame and old trope. And just lazy. Besides it's all based on the fact that the USA larped as Rome when it was founded, so it lends itself to comparison. You can make similar arguments for Europe.
>>18464479>Besides it's all based on the fact that the USA larped as Rome when it was foundedThe decline of the US is far more similar to that of Rome than its rise.>You can make similar arguments for Europe.America and post-war Europe are effectively one empire, with the US being the imperial core and Europe the outlying client states.
>>18464495Europe is more akin to the early Roman republic's Italian foederati, than anything else. They're nominally independent states that owe military fealty to the United States and have limited ability to conduct foreign policy without US oversight. But even this isn't a 1:1 comparison, since Rome preferred to govern in a very top-down manner, relying on its military might to keep its vassals in line, while the US prefers to create many economic entanglements which create a natural dependency in the vassal country. Rome's vassals occasionally rebelled, if Rome looked weak, but America's vassals are so tightly bound to the American economy that the best they can manage is weak attempts at economic sabotage as a form of rebellion.
>>18463998I agree, the Principate parts are a little weak because it starts being a family drama rather than some macroscopic view of the empire. Haven’t listened to it in years but iirc he puts a couple filler episodes about “life in the roman empire” to pad it out”?Still, the early republic and later fall of the west tend to be the better parts, podcast wise
>>18464509>>18464495I personally view the US relationship with Europe in the same light as Rome post third/fourth Macedonian war, where Greece was firmly under the Roman boot but the Greeks still viewed themselves as being culturally/morally superior to the Romans The state the US is in today i see as being late republic stage, not late empire. Trump is much more a gracchi esque figure than anyone cares to admit, we’re still a solid half century away from the real destabilization like the Sulla/marius naked power grabs, but the entirety of the polity of the US government neatly lines up with the state of the Roman senate in the 1st century BC, from the bribes to the mystery religions to the anti plebeian sentiment
>>18464572>>18463998I really like the principate stuff but usually start over on the poddy at alexander severus/crisis of the third century, the country is completely different than the one that fascinates me after that point Also there is a couple episodes dedicated to Roman life like you mentioned which I find fascinating, I listened to this podcast on repeat for like 4 years straight and essentially have the entirety of romes history from founding to the crisis of the third century memorized
>>18463922I liked it, but Revolutions was better IMO. The season about the Mexican revolution was especially kino
>>18464080Just wait for a democratic president again and youll be cheering about how right he is.
>>18463922listened to it at least twice all the way through. if you're not interested in hearing about emperors, just drop it. later on it becomes "this emperor sent this army from Hispania to meet this rebel emperor/invaders army in Noricum" or whatever. Some sidetracks into Christian history but generally just a description of battles.Maybe try his Revolutions series. It didn't grab me but you might enjoy it.
>>18464577Feel pretty confident that in the not too distant future we'll probably have some Palantir/Thiel-backed quasi-military dictator (or series of dictators) ruling over a skeleton of a democratic republic (we'll still have elections, they just won't matter). Even as bad as Trump is fucking up, I think Vance or Rubio will probably be able to narrow clinch a victory in 2028, & people will find out that the authoritarian trend wasn't just the result of the personality of Trump or the AltRight or Moldbug's blogposts or whatever else. If somehow the Democrats win, they'll most likely double down on all their bullshit (open the border, gender affirming care for minors, lawfare against their political opponents, letting violent criminals and mentally ill homeless run wild, Neo-Luddite backlash against AI/tech, assorted Woke 2.0 nonsense, etc.), & this will further radicalize the Republicans & their supporters to increasingly extreme steps as soon as the party gets back in power, which will probably be literally the next election cycle. Who knows how long the cycle will continue? But it will also culminate in some sort of one party state, probably led by the Republican party who will maintain their grip on power 1st by voter ID laws, gerrymandering, then by more extreme measures (despite all the insanity/stupidity of the Republicans, they at least understand human nature & are also effectively a Caesarian party of sorts, w/ Democrats being the party of the PMC & ethnic/religious/sexual minorities). In order for the Democrats to rule, they would have to abandon many of the issues that their PMC base cares a great deal about, & at this point, this stuff is so central to their identity that this is basically an impossible demand.
>>18465277I think in order for a democracy to flourish, you basically need a homogenous, relatively low-density population who aren't too dissimilar in culture & values. This stuff just doesn't scale beyond a certain level. If you want a society like Switzerland, you need Swiss demographics. As a society becomes increasingly diverse, & its population grows beyond a certain level, it inevitably becomes less democratic. I don't think there's any avoiding it. America is just too big & full of all sorts of different people who hate eachother.
>>18464577I also agree that US is more similar to the corrupt late republic than any other stage of Roman civilization. US institutions are decaying, but haven't yet crumbled enough that you can have actual authoritarian rule. But something I think is peculiar to the United States, which isn't present in Rome, is the way that centralizing power around the presidency only serves to weaken the federal government as an institution, because of the status of the States as nominally sovereign entities. This isn't respected much in the modern US, by design, but Trump attempting to enforce executive orders with federal law enforcement against the wishes of the state governors, and having to battle the legal institutions of the states, shows how much the power of the federal government depends upon the assumed cooperation of the states.
>>18463922I agree that it drops off by the time of the emperors, but I think that's got more to do with the emperor-part of roman history being less interesting compared to what came before.The era of the roman republic and the immediate aftermath was the story of the rise and fall of something approaching a democracy, the greatest power europe had ever seen, and the characters with competing desires to control and shape rome in their own image. The romantic view of building such a society, and growing attached to something that comes close to what our world is now, grows the emotions we have towards the rise and fall of such a place. In contrast, the era of the roman empire is the story of decadence and decay. Like a train wreck that takes centuries to properly fall. It's just sad to learn about, so why bother.If learning about the roman republic was like watching your friend get married and divorced, then learning about the roman empire is like watching your friend die of cancer.
>>18463922He's a big Republican fanboy, he really phones it in after
>>18463922Does he ever discuss roman literature or is it just emperors and generals?
